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Date: 1611

"As in water face answereth to face, so the heart of man to man."

— Author Unknown

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Date: 1641

"Now if we are to become aware of something, it is necessary for the thing to act on the cognitive faculty by transmitting its semblance to the faculty or by informing the faculty with its semblance. Hence it seems clear that the faculty itself, not being outside itself, cannot transmit a semblan...

— Gassendi, Pierre (1592-1655)

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Date: w. 1628, published in 1684, 1701

"We can best learn how mental intuition is to be employed by comparing it with ordinary vision."

— Descartes, René (1596-1650)

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Date: 1692

"[T]he Explanation whereof is allowed by all men as satisfactory, 'tis this, in Tab. 41. Fig. 2. the Image a b of the Object A B is painted on the Retina inverted, and yet the Eye (or rather the Soul by means of the Eye) sees the Object erect and in its natural Posture."

— Molyneux, William (1656-1698)

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Date: 1704

"As thro' the Artist's intervening Glass, / Our Eye observes the distant Planets pass; / A little we discover; but allow, / That more remains unseen, than Art can show: / So whilst our Mind it's Knowledge wou'd improve; / (It's feeble Eye intent on Things above) / High as We may, We lift our Rea...

— Prior, Matthew (1664-1721)

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Date: 1731

"Whereas Sense it self is but the Passive Perception of some Individual Material Forms, but to Know or Understand is Actively to Comprehend a thing by some Abstract, Free and Universal Reasonings, from whence the Mind as it were looking down (as Boetius expresseth it) upon the Individuals below i...

— Cudworth, Ralph (1617-1688)

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Date: 1731

"The Eye which is placed in a Level with the Sea, and touches the Surface of it, cannot take any large Prospect upon the Sea, much less see the whole Amplitude of it. But an Eye Elevated to a higher Station, and from thence looking down, may comprehensively view the whole Sea at once, or at least...

— Cudworth, Ralph (1617-1688)

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Date: 1731

"Wherefore that we may the better understand how far the Passion of Sense reaches, and where the Activity of the Mind begins, we will compare these three Things together: First, a Mirror, Looking-glass or Crystal Globe; Secondly, a Living Eye, that is, a Seeing or Perceptive Mirror or Looking-gla...

— Cudworth, Ralph (1617-1688)

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Date: 1731

"For what is Pulchritude in Visible Objects, or Harmony in Sounds, but the Proportion, Symmetry and Commensuration of Figures, and Sounds to one another, whereby Infinity is Measured and Determined, and Multiplicity and Variety vanquished and triumphed over by Unity, and by that means they become...

— Cudworth, Ralph (1617-1688)

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Date: 1751, 1777

"And, indeed, without such a correction of appearances, both in internal and external sentiment, men could never think or talk steadily on any subject; while their fluctuating situations produce a continual variation on objects, and throw them into such different and contrary lights and positions."

— Hume, David (1711-1776)

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The Mind is a Metaphor is authored by Brad Pasanek, Assistant Professor of English, University of Virginia.